


The Other

by lorcaswhisky (aristofranes)



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: F/M, Gen, Prime!Lorca is alive, and handwavy science, interspersed with some less fluffy stuff, some fluffy stuff, with a healthy dash of non-existent plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-03-08 22:54:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13468296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aristofranes/pseuds/lorcaswhisky
Summary: "Gabriel's head throbbed with pain.That was a good sign..."Gabriel Lorca is held hostage by his Mirror self and his thoughts turn to Kat.Spoilers for episode 12, Vaulting Ambition.





	The Other

Gabriel's head throbbed with pain.

That was a good sign.

_Sedative wearing off. Now think._

He screwed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth, trying to block out the signals being sent from his slowly awakening nerves.

Not that opening his eyes made the slightest bit of difference. It was pitch black. He reached out a shaking hand to steady himself against the floor as a wave of claustrophobia threatened to overcome him.

_Breathe. Think._

He hadn't come to Gabriel's cell, wherever that was, for days now. The water supply was running dangerously low. Food was gone.

_No-one knows you're here._

Gabriel tried to piece together the last few days – weeks? – but the harder he thought, the more time seemed to stretch and compress.

He had been furious, the Other him, dragged Gabriel into the light and beaten him so hard that even through the fog of the sedative he thought his luck might have finally run out. Or that he'd finally caught a lucky break. A permanent escape. Either way.

“You lied to me!”

_Did I? That was clever of me._

The light caught the flash of gold on the Other's uniform as his fist whistled through the air, before connecting hard with the side of Gabriel's face.

“You said you didn't know her. Turns out you know her _very_ well.”

_Kat._

“But don't worry. I've dealt with it.”

_Kat--_

*

_The mattress dipped suddenly, jolting Gabriel awake._

_“_ Shit! _”_

_“Hnng?”_

_“We've overslept!” Kat was already on her feet, snatching at discarded items of uniform scattered over the floor. Gabriel propped himself up on one elbow, smiling sleepily as in her haste she frantically pulled on his trousers, swore again, and scrabbled around to locate her own._

_“Dunno what you're so worried about. You could damn near teach that class,” he yawned._

_“Get. Up,” snapped Kat, throwing Gabriel's jacket at his head._

_“You're a bad influence, Kat,” Gabriel grinned, swinging his legs out of the bed and stretching languorously._

_“Put your damn pants on.”_

_“So fickle. Pants off one minute, pants on the next--"_

_His sock hit him square in the eye._

*

_\-- Kat._

Gabriel's head swam with pain.

“What ... have ... you ... done?” he croaked, every word like fire in his throat.

The Other's face was twisted with fury.

“What I had to. It's your fault. You _lied_ ,” he spat. He threw Gabriel to the floor as if he were no more than a child's toy.

“I've come too far for you to ruin this now.”

Then a Starfleet regulation boot came into focus, and there was darkness again.

*

 _“You've ruined it. You've ruined_ everything _.”_

_“Kat--"_

_“I needed you to be serious once, just_ once _. But you couldn't even do that.”_

_“Kat--"_

_“Even now! Even now you still won't say it.”_

_“Kat--"_

_The door slammed shut._

*

_Where?_

It wasn't the _Buran,_ he was sure of that. He knew every bolt of that ship, knew the hum of the engines, the tremor of the warp drive powering up.

_So where?_

Another ship. The Other had his badge.

_Captain._

This ship was new. The glimpses he had caught in between interrogations had been enough to see that. It _smelled_ new. But it was all wrong. There were strange weapons, cases with skeletons he had never seen before. Once, he was sure he had heard voices conversing, and a roar like some great nightmare monster.

_Need to get out._

He rubbed his face wearily and immediately regretted it. Deep breaths helped to regulate the pain a little.

_What if he doesn't come back?_

It must have been days since that last visit.

_What if he doesn't come back?_

He'd die of dehydration long before anyone found him.

_She'd know what to do._

*

_“This is the best idea you've ever had.”_

_Gabriel snorted._

_“A_ better _idea would have been two bottles,” he said, inspecting the empty vessel. “We're all out.”_

_“Shhhh.” Kat patted the space on the blanket. “Just for a minute. Just ... shhhh.”_

_Gabriel stretched out next to her. He felt her shuffle over, and she rested her head against his chest, face tilted up towards the sky. He felt a flush of warmth not entirely born of cheap whisky._

_The Perseids danced overhead. Gabriel barely noticed them. In the starlight, she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen._

_“Did you make a wish?” she murmured._

_“Don't be absurd.”_

_“Doesn't hurt to try.”_

_“Doesn't help, either.”_

_There was silence for a while._

_“I leave in three days,” Kat said eventually._

_“I know.”_

_She sat up and looked down at him, eyes full of sadness._

_“I'll miss you,” she said softly._

_Gabriel felt his throat catch. He could tell her now. Should tell her now._

_“You're damn right you will,” he smirked instead._

_She laughed and the moment was gone and, for the only time in his life, Gabriel Lorca felt his fate shift beneath him._

_“One day I'll be your boss, and_ then _you'll have to be nice to me.”_

_Gabriel smiled and drew her closer to him._

_“What do you mean, one day?”_

*

Gabriel leant back against the wall of his cell, his breath ragged, staring blankly into the darkness.

_Concentrate._

The Other had left him alone, mostly, after that interrogation. The door of his cell opened at increasingly irregular intervals, the light quickly blocked out by his silhouette as he threw a ration of water and what could only be described as food at Gabriel. Then—

“When ... I get out of here--" Gabriel rasped, surprising even himself.

The Other laughed.

“What? What will you do?”

“... you'll pay,” Gabriel finished feebly.

The Other leant down, his face close to Gabriel's.

“When you get out of here – _if_ you get out of here – there’ll be nothing left.” He smiled. “But maybe you haven't heard the news.”

The Other hauled Gabriel to his feet, led him roughly into the other room. It was barely half-lit, but after the darkness of the cell it was like needles in his eyes. The Other reached for a PADD, brought it close to Gabriel's face.

“Watch.”

It was the _Buran._ Gabriel felt his stomach twist at the sight of his ship, under heavy fire from Klingon warships. And then, suddenly, she was gone, engulfed in flames. Gabriel's eyes burned in the glare of the screen.

“I must say, it's one of the more effective self-destruct programmes I've seen.”

_No._

“Who ... who gave the order?” he managed.

“You did.”

The Other laughed.

“Your footnote in Starfleet history. Congratulations, Captain Lorca.”

*

 _“Congratulations, Captain Lorca. Welcome to the_ Buran. _”_

_Gabriel grinned, leaning against the desk in his ready room._

_“Captain Lorca. I could get used to that.”_

_Kat’s hologram looked him up and down._

_“You scrubbed up well. You almost look respectable.”_

_“Well, if you swing on by here I can cure you of that delusion...”_

_“Spoke too soon,” Kat laughed. “How are you settling in?”_

_“You know me. Making friends.”_

_“Pissing people off?”_

_“Isn’t that my job now?”_

_“As your boss, I’d have to respectfully disagree.”_

_“And that’s_ your _job now,” Gabriel teased._

_There was a brief silence._

_“I missed you, Gabriel,” Kat said softly._

I missed you too. I’m sorry. I love you.

_“Damn right you did.”_

_Kat stiffened, almost imperceptibly._

Blew it.

_“You haven’t changed.”_

_“Can’t improve perfection.”_

_“True, so why did you stop trying?”_

_“Ouch.”_

_Kat's body language was suddenly business-like._

_“I'm sending you some coordinates. We're picking up some interesting readings and you're going to go and check them out,” she said briskly._

_“I look forward to it, Kat.”_

_“Admiral Cornwell. Let's keep things professional.”_

_“Of course. Admiral.”_

_“Captain. Do your best not to piss anyone off too much.”_

_“I don't make promises I can't keep,” shrugged Gabriel with a smile he didn't feel, desperately trying to reset the conversation._

_“Maybe you have changed, then.”_

_*_

Alone in his cell, Gabriel slept fitfully and dreamed of home.

**Author's Note:**

> (I wrote this during a fit of insomnia at 2 in the morning, so apologies for any glaring mistakes. I'm sure by next week's episode none of this will still be possible, but in the meantime I'm crossing everything for an appearance by Prime!Lorca...)
> 
> In creating Prime!Lorca, I've taken the Emperor's words at face value (risky, I know). If Mirror!Lorca really is the worst kind of sexual predator, then Prime!Lorca, for all his flaws, only has eyes for one woman, who he holds in near sacred regard.
> 
> Mirror!Lorca believes firmly in fate and destiny; I've tried to keep Prime!Lorca more firmly grounded. 
> 
> I'm also working on the assumption that, up until the point where he broke cover, Mirror!Lorca had been doing a reasonable job of impersonating Prime!Lorca, and so he's pretty much the same smug, snarky bastard we thought we knew and loved (minus the space fascism).
> 
> (I'd love to hear your comments. It's been a good few years since I committed words to paper, so that goes to show how hard I've fallen for Discovery!)


End file.
